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Tuesday, January 4, 2011

I've been extremely blessed this year to have friends and family offer me free produce. One of my friends used Facebook to invite people over to take pears off her hands. Well a tightwad never turns her back on free food. But what do you do when you get pounds upon pounds of free pears? I used them to create pie filling and pear butter - good for gifting to neighbors. Not to mention free food, I also like to think the pears provided an afternoon of family bonding as I had my husband do the peeling and I did the slicing. A good date is one where you can talk and really become closer, so I like to believe that working together qualifies as a good date. I'm not sure how he felt about it, but since he's not into movies anyway, and he's probably cheaper than I am, I think he would have agreed!

Pear Butter

So you want some recipes? Well, like a lot of people, the internet is my friend. My girl friend emailed me a copy of a recipe for pear butter, but in the end I only used it for inspiration. Then I mostly followed the Pear Butter Recipe from The Bad Girls Kitchen. Truthfully, it's simple. You throw a bunch of pears in the crock pot, add some sugar to taste, as well as spices (I used two cinnamon sticks and then threw in a bit of cardamom and ginger at the very end), and let it cook for ever. I used an immersion blender a few times throughout the process to help make it smooth. After about 15 hours bottled it.

Future Pie

As for pie filling, well, again I went to the internet. I think everyone has a favorite recipe site, and mine is allrecipes. There were plenty to choose from, but I just went with the Fresh Pear Pie basic type recipe I could throw in a pie shell later. Just be careful when you fill the Ziploc to not overdo it and put a hole in the corner. Yep, been there done that.

And just so you know, as I was looking through allrecipes' site I found a ton of other pear related baked goods I wanted to try. I did freeze some plain sliced pears in their own bag, and maybe someday soon, when I'm not feeling so peared-out I'll bust it open and make some pear bread.

Sarah
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